achieved without laborious and costly recruitment and training. In fact, this achievement was preceded by years of preparations, which resulted in such a leap that allowed the network to step in and lead when the moment came. About Al Jazeera’s phenomenal global presence, Souag remarks, the surprise was Al Jazeera outpacing its Western competitors in their own domain through years of proper recruitment, training and extensive fieldwork. During those years, he adds, “Al Jazeera earned huge cred- ibility from different parties in conflict zones, who thus have afforded it access to news sources”. With the continued success in providing exclusive war coverage, “Al Jazeera realised its distinction remained in its ability to cover epic wars by utilising all of its resources” (1) . With the successive wars in the region, Al Jazeera’s status contin- ued to rise in the global media landscape. This became evident during the invasion of Iraq in 2003, Israel’s war on Lebanon in 2006, and later during the three Israeli wars on Gaza. Throughout its extensive expe- rience in war coverage, Al Jazeera’s identity developed on the interna- tional stage in its second phase of evolution. Describing this develop- ment, former Director General, Wadah Khanfar, observes, “this phase witnessed increasing reliance on Al Jazeera’s field coverage and exclu- sive resource and significant decline in its reliance on the audio-visual services of news agencies” (2) . It has become evident that Al Jazeera’s successes in the field cov- erage of major events, especially wars, established the importance of focusing on the human aspect and the suffering of civilians during these calamities. This aspect has largely been ignored by most international media networks due to the interests of the centres of power financing them and therefore setting their agendas. On the contrary, Al Jazeera found itself, as it reported on major events to the world, closer to the human aspect of journalism and more harmonious with its vision of making humans the focus of its coverage.
(1) Ibid.
(2) Wadah Khanfar, personal interview, Doha, December 2019.
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